James Wade felt the effects of the Dirk van Duijvenbode shoulder injury in more ways than one at the European Championship in Dortmund, but is through to the second round.
Wade prevailed averaging just 80, with Van Duijvenbode struggling on 75 and both hitting only 25% of doubles. But 'The Machine' said he had to adapt with Van Duijvenbode's Deep Heat supposedly stinging his eyes.
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"Dirk's obviously not very well," said Wade post match. "He had a lot of Deep Heat on, it was burning my eyes for the first four legs."
"Then I adapted to it and when I did get to 3-1, I kept thinking about the Deep Heat. I've never experienced that. It made my eyes water."
He also snapped back at the notion of being content with his year so far and said that the hunger still remains that he wants to write a few wrongs before walking away from the sport.
"Why would I be content? I've looked at my earnings for the last 12 months, why would I be content? I've been off the back end of being really not well but you can't keep harping on about it. That's reality."
"People will say it's an excuse, but I know where I was and I know what I did. I'm not content and I'm not happy. That's why I'm still here, financially I could walk away from the game tomorrow and be happily ever after. But I think I'd have a left a few stones unturned. But I've still not unturned enough stones."
"I want to win another tournament, that would be a quick march for me and a quick step. Easy entry back into the top flight of darts. At the moment I'm playing like a beginner. In there when he was struggling like mad, I had nothing to give which is disappointing."
This hunger also saw him admit that many of those in the World Series and other invitationals don't deserve their spots over him, but that's his fault he believes.
"There's a select few that are amazing and I could name those players. Gezzy (Price), Michael van Gerwen, Luke Humphries, there's a few others. I think I'm as good as those players. There's plenty of openings and I've had those and I've not made those openings so it's my own fault."